


underneath and unexplored

by calciseptine



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Paranoia, Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sibling Incest, Winter, Перевод на русский | Translation in Russian
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-30
Updated: 2015-10-30
Packaged: 2018-04-27 12:28:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5048569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calciseptine/pseuds/calciseptine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ford knows—logically—that nothing truly sinister lingers in the still and silent woods beyond the cabin. The inter-dimensional rift has been sealed, Bill Cipher has been cast back into the pit of the nightmare realm, and the world has been spared an apocalypse. Yet if thirty years of traversing an innumerable amount of alternate universes has taught Ford anything, it is that there is nothing more dangerous than complacency.</p><p> </p><p>a.k.a. that fic in which Ford is a (reasonably) paranoid bastard and Stan does what he can to ease his brother’s mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	underneath and unexplored

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the [Stancest Halloween Exchange](http://a-stancest-halloween.tumblr.com) for [foxyrick](http://foxyrick.tumblr.com). She requested "sitting on the couch and snuggling and drinking hot chocolate" and/or "bondage".
> 
> I went with the 'and'.
> 
> This fic is [now available](https://ficbook.net/readfic/4193912) in Russian! Many thanks to [madnessfk](http://madnessfk.tumblr.com) for their work.

Ford has forgotten what winter is like in Gravity Falls in the years he's been gone, and he finds that the stillness of the woods beyond the cabin unsettles him. He is too used to the chaos of skipping from universe to universe—too used to the ever-changing landscapes of different worlds—too used to being chased by powerful nightmares—that the stagnant scenery outside the walls of the cabin put him on edge.

"You're being paranoid again," Stan tells him over breakfast. Ford hasn't had a reliable breakfast in over thirty years; he finds that the repetition of eggs, toast, and bacon is a luxury, even if Stan tends to overcook the eggs and undercook the bacon.

"I'm being cautious," Ford replies, peering out the frosted kitchen window. The snow stretches across the lawn and clings to the skeletons of the deciduous trees and the boughs of dark green conifers. "Or don't you remember what happened this summer?"

"I'm old, Ford, not senile," Stan returns, but there is no real heat in his words. A lifetime of argument and struggle has dulled the sharpness of Stan's bite—or perhaps Stan's bark has always been for show, and it is Ford who has changed, who has become hard. "The portal has been closed. You can relax."

Ford scans the woods one last time. The snow is freshly fallen, thick and crisp, and has been disturbed by no creature save for Stan's stubborn old goat. Nothing seems amiss, so Ford releases the edge of the curtains and allows the threadbare gingham fabric to fall back into place.

"You can never be too careful," Ford murmurs, and in wordless reply, Stan simply pushes the plate of food closer to his brother.

.

After the inter-dimensional rift had been sealed, Stan and Ford struck a second agreement. It had been more of a conversation than a list of demands, and though Ford would have preferred to shut down the Mystery Shack for good, Stan had cajoled him into a fairer compromise.

It is according to this second agreement that Stan has closed the Mystery Shack for the season. Tourism is unsurprisingly slow in the winter—only the locals dare to venture past the plowed pavement of Main Street, drawn in by the possibility of entertainment to alleviate their small town boredom—and it is a mere mild inconvenience to shut down for several months while Stan attempts to renovate the space.

"The entrance to the lab cannot be behind a vending machine," Ford had said, once Stan had made it clear that his tourist trap would remain. "And it cannot be in a public space. Seriously, Stanley, what were you thinking?"

Stan had tried to argue the point. "You're being a worry wart, poindexter," he scoffed, crossing his thick arms across his broad chest. "Nobody's accidentally typed in the code in thirty years. Take it from a seasoned gambler—the odds are definitely in the house's favor on this."

The location of the entrance had been one of Ford's sticking points, however, and while Stan was correct in assuming that the statistics were in their favor, Ford was immensely uncomfortable with remote off-chance that a child would button mash their way into a tenuously held secret. So he stood by this stipulation, even as Stan constantly grumbled about the difficulty of changing the ground floor's layout.

"It's not like there's a functional gateway down there," Stan griped. "And we could always say that it is a defunct exhibit. Actually, now that I think about it, why don't we—"

"No," Ford had all but snarled, his six-fingered hand curling into a fist at the thought of strangers down in the lab, gawking at his life's dismantled work. "That area is off limits."

This was another stipulation, yet it was the only one Stan had wisely let stand uncontested. 

Eventually, the red and gold autumn browned into winter, and with one final—and immensely lucrative—Halloween send-off that the entire town attended, Stan closed the Mystery Shack to begin renovations. 

Structurally speaking, the cabin has not been altered since it was built. Ford had originally intended for the upper house—with the ground floor, the second floor, and the attic—to be a residential space, and for the basement—lower level two and three—to be where he conducted his research. His intentions had degraded swiftly, however, and after five years of studying the anomalies of Gravity Falls, his experiments had spread like a fungus to every corner of the cabin. In Ford's long absence, Stan had relocated the more dangerous of Ford's machines and specimens to lower level three. The more harmless things that remained were either hidden in the nooks and crannies of the cabin, such as the attic, or were out in plain sight—for example, the Tyrannosaurus Rex skull, which Stan covered with an appalling crocheted doily and used as a side table.

"What?" Stan asked with a shrug when Ford had first seen the fossil's place beside the sagging armchair. "It spices up the décor."

The disparity between what Ford remembers and the reality Ford returned to is jarring. He knows that he reacted badly in the hours following his return—knows now that his brother did what he had to, knows that Stan would not be Stan if he had chosen a different course of action—but it had still been difficult to swallow his bruised and bristling pride.

_Strange,_ Ford had thought when Stan cornered him, in that crushingly hot week at the end of August, and forced a negotiation. _I always thought I was the reasonable twin._

It had taken several hours—several terrible hours in which they probed at scars that should have been too old to sting—but by the end, they had a compromise, and the tentative beginnings of catharsis. They sealed their tenuous pact with a lingering handshake, a business-like action made intimate as Stan curled both of his broad hands around one of Ford's like a warm and welcome cage.

"Well, the Shack isn't the Stan-o-War," Stan had said, his straight smile a complement to Ford's crooked frown, "but it's a start."

And it was not until later, when the read-outs from Ford's machine turned into numerical nonsense before his eyes, that Ford realized he could not focus on anything but the memory of Stan's touch, and the stupid, foolish hope it inspired in the long empty chambers of his heart.

.

After Ford and Stan have finished eating, and after Ford has rinsed the crumbs and the smears of ketchup away from their plates, Stan heads into the old gift shop to continue his renovations while Ford goes into Stan's office. The small room contains a newly padlocked cabinet nestled against the heavy safe; Ford presses his thumb to the fingerprint reader to open it and, when it beeps in affirmation of his touch, Ford carefully considers the weapons within. Three of the seven items inside were on Ford's person when he returned—the shotgun, the pistol, and the combat knife—while the other four were meticulously and feverishly assembled in the month after the portal reopened.

"What is this?" Stan tried to joke when Ford assembled the cabinet and programmed Stan in as the only other person who could open it. "Are you preparing for war or something?"

"Yes," Ford had answered, effectively killing Stan's attempt at levity. "Yes, Stanley, that is exactly what I am preparing for."

In the end, they had not needed the weapons, as it was the children who saved them and their world by working together to permanently close the rift Ford and Stan created. Ford is still torn by pride and by guilt; his great niece and nephew are two of the strongest people Ford has known, in any dimension, but the mistake they had been forced to fix had been his—and Stan's—not theirs.

_What's done is done,_ Ford berates himself as he reaches for his faithful shotgun. _You know better than most how futile it is to want to change what is past._

Ford checks the shotgun's breech for ammo—the glowing rounds are near full capacity—and, thus satisfied, Ford leaves the office, walks down the hallway, and takes his worn duster out of the mudroom closet. He also grabs a long scarf that smells strongly of cedar and an old knit hat. He puts all his gear on quickly and efficiently before he turns around and glances at himself in the plain mirror tacked to the wall.

"Too visible," Ford mutters, dissatisfied, his eyes lingering on splash of crimson knotted at his throat. His black coat, black boots, and black sweater are bad enough against the soft winter landscape, but the scarf and the matching hat are worse. The vibrant red is a liability; it would stand out like a small beacon of color in monochromatic world beyond the door.

Ford's hands rise to remove the scarf. He will be cold without it, but—

_Stop being paranoid,_ a corner of Ford's brain reprimands. As usual, that particular corner sounds a lot like his brother when Stan is at his most stubborn. _You know there's nothing out there but gnomes and deer._

"It isn't paranoia," Ford snaps even as he drops his hands from his throat and scowls at his reflection. "There's nothing paranoid about being vigilant."

The mirror, of course, has nothing further to add to the conversation, so, eventually, Ford turns away from his own glare. He takes a moment to dig his leather gloves out from an inner pocket of his long coat; then to adjust the strap of his shotgun scabbard so the wide buckle settles comfortably across his sternum; and finally to bury the anxious, squirming doubts he has about his attire.

_Gnomes and deer,_ Ford thinks again and again as he opens the back door and steps outside the protective wards laid into the cement foundation of the cabin. _Gnomes and deer, gnomes and deer. There's nothing out there but gnomes and deer._

And perhaps—if Ford repeats the mantra long enough and convincingly enough—he will one day believe the truth of it, too.

.

The air outside is brittle with the cold. Every inhale Ford takes burns, sinks sharply into Ford's lungs, and needles the tiny alveolar pockets as oxygen passes through the thin membrane and into his bloodstream. When he exhales, the body-warmed remnants rise. There is no wind to disturb the delicate water droplets as they disperse and—as the impermanent cloud dissipates from the inevitability of diffusion—the cycle begins anew.

Ford’s patrol is a three mile circuit around the cabin that would take him about twenty minutes to complete on a normal day. Because of the snowfall, however, his sweep takes much longer than that. Last night's snowstorm had blown in from the east and had swept cold, moist air down the mountains and into the valley. When added to the older precipitation that has accumulated upon the frozen ground, the blanket of snow is at least as high as Ford's knees.

Unfortunately, the fresh powder is too light to snowshoe or ski over. It breaks easily beneath the weight of Ford's boots but, when he tries to walk forward, the snow clings to his shins and forces him to take a huge lunge rather than a step. He must raise his knee as high as his waist to clear the snow and then plant his foot so he can drag the rest of his body forward. 

It is not easy-going. Ford is by no means out-of-shape—his thick muscles are roped tightly and efficiently around his still strong bones—but it is not long before Ford’s thighs begins to tremble and his core starts to ache. Lactic acid builds in his muscles and makes them burn. Sweat forms on the nape of his neck; at the edge of his gray hairline; in the shallow dip between his pectorals; and across the smooth plane between his scapulae. His simple cotton undershirt sticks to his skin unpleasantly. More than once, Ford is sorely tempted to remove the clothing he had previously debated on not wearing at all.

Yet despite the temptation, the hat and the scarf remain for as long as Ford trudges onward. He may be uncomfortable wearing what he is—for both physical and mental reasons—but he is not an idiot. Ford may be incredibly warm underneath the bundled layers of wool and leather and cotton, but it is too cold out for any of his extremities to be exposed for longer than ten or fifteen minutes. He does not need to lose any parts of his body to frostbite, or stupidity.

It takes Ford nearly two hours to complete his circuit, as he must stop frequently to catch his breath and rest his legs. The journey is not the most demanding thing Ford has ever done—not by a long shot—but he is stuck firmly in the middle of his golden years. Even when he was in his prime, when his strength and stamina were at their peak, Ford would have been winded by such exertion; yet despite their necessity, he hates the extra stops. It gives him time to stare into the unknowable depths of the woods and imagine what might be able to elude the limited range of his human perception.

_Stop,_ Ford berates himself as he forces his gaze down to his knees. _You know there's nothing out there but gnomes and deer. There's nothing out there, there's nothing out there, there is nothing—_

Ford cannot truly convince himself with his mantra because he knows it is not completely accurate. He had spent almost six years documenting the anomalies of Gravity Falls; he has either seen or deduced the existence of many creatures that inhabit the thick forest that surrounds the area. Most of these creatures are harmless. Strange, perhaps, but as timid and as willing to flee at the sight of a human as a startled rabbit. Very few have posed an actual threat to Ford's safety—he carries his shotgun for a reason—but these simple creatures are not why Ford stares into wilderness beyond the safety of the second perimeter.

Ford stares because he knows that the most terrifying monsters are the ones he cannot shoot.

Shaking the cloudiness of his thoughts from his mind, Ford waits until his heart no longer pounding against the shield of his sternum to trudge forward. His thighs groan as they restart for what feels like the thousandth time. The cold, which had been blissful against his sweaty skin for the initial leg of his journey, has begun to edge into a penetrating and unpleasant numbness. He thinks longingly of the cabin and its warmth as he takes his enormous steps, his muscles protesting and the shotgun smacking his backside with every twist.

_Five more,_ Ford tells himself and his sore body. _You only have to check five more._

With this new mantra, Ford takes another step, and another, and another, and... 

.

Several months ago, after the hole in sky had been stitched back together and the nightmares had been cast back into the pit of their realm, Ford established a secondary barrier around the cabin. The spell—for lack of a better word—was a specific configuration of pictograms: runes, mostly, with a dash of varied astrological signs and lowercase Greek letters. Ford had placed them in a carefully calculated nine by nine by nine pattern around the cabin. It was not as powerful as the primary barrier made of the unicorn hair Mabel and her friends retrieved, but it did not have to be. 

"The barriers are like doors," Ford had explained to Stan when he detailed his plan to erect the second barrier. "The one around the cabin is like the heavy metal door of a bank vault. Nothing can get in. The one I will put around the perimeter is like a regular door with a security alarm. If anything crosses it, we'll know."

"A security alarm?" Stan asked, his gruff voice tainted with incredulity. One of his thick eyebrows quirked upward in skepticism. "This ain't gonna go off every time a bunny rabbit decides to take a stroll, is it?"

Ford frowned at Stan's disbelieving tone. He knew he had explained the metaphysics behind the unicorn hair to Stan several times. Stan always faked a yawn halfway through the explanation—usually when Ford started to use words that did not yet exist in their dimension—and told Ford he didn't care about his magic mumbo-jumbo. Ford had been sure Stan did that to rile him up, like he used to do when they were kids, but it has been over four decades since then, and Ford could not be absolutely certain.

"It will not," Ford replied slowly. "The barrier does not register physical beings on our place of existence. It monitors entities that move on the astral plane, and—"

Stan had raised a hand to cut him off. "I was pullin' your pigtails, nerd," he said, though not unkindly. "I got it the first ten times you explained it. I'm just wonderin' why you feel like you gotta do this. That triangle guy is gone. The sky ain't cracked open. We're safe, aren't we?"

"No one is ever safe," Ford had answered. "The most anyone can be is prepared."

Stan paused. His eyes flickered away from Ford—then out the window where the darkness was—then back to Ford. Whatever he saw on Ford's face made him sigh heavily and take another sip of his half-empty, off-brand beer.

"Do what you need to," said Stan.

Ford knows Stan thinks he's paranoid; he knows Stan thinks that the secondary perimeter is unnecessary; and he knows Stan thinks that Ford's frequent patrols are excessive. But Stan was not chased across the multiverse by literal nightmares for three decades; Stan never escaped a realm of chaos armed with nothing but honed wit and miraculous luck; and Stan never drew a shielding spell around himself in the dirt just to get a few hours of uninterrupted sleep.

Stan does not know what Ford knows and—as long as Ford does what he must—Stan blissfully never will.

.


End file.
